Reviews of anything and everything worth watching on TV or reading in books...

Thursday, 28 March 2013

The Faceless Ones

My biggest difficulty
in this mammoth task – that of re-watching, and then blogging, each and every Doctor Who serial in order, including
the missing serials – is not that which I had expected.It is not one of recon-fatigue, but a simple
lack of time.Of course, I have a real
job, in the real world.This real job,
teaching English and Drama in a Private School, is a time-consuming one, using
up almost every waking moment of my time.As such, during term-time, I lose evenings, weekends and even some of my
holiday time to lesson planning, rehearsals, marking and choreography.As such, come term-time, the entire project
has to come to a screeching halt.The
problem with this, though, is that my notes for the latest blog – Patrick
Troughton’s The Faceless Ones, for
those keeping count – were written at the end of the October half term, but
never made it onto the computer.As
such, page after page of blurred notes with bullet-point, throw-away phrases
mean almost nothing to me.Still, this
entry will try to make sense of that nonsense.Wish me luck.

The principle issue that most fans have with this serial is
simply that it is not completely available in visual form; the entire thing
exists in an audio format, but with only two existing episodes – indeed, the
two least interesting episodes, judging by what we know from the soundtracks –
it is difficult to judge how successful it is.Likewise, in a series of short and snappy serials like The Underwater Menace and The Macra Terror, it seems a little
sluggish at times.Running at 6
episodes, compared with the majority of the season running at 4, it seems like
there is almost not enough storyline to fill the time.Of course, we know that this is an issue of
necessity; The Underwater Menace went
notoriously over-budget, and so The
Faceless Ones, which is surprisingly restrained by early Doctor Who standards, makes full use instead
of the opportunity to use location filming, and so we end up with lots of
running around on tarmac and inside the main terminal buildings.Costumes are naturalistic, due to the time
setting, which means that few costumes and props need creating for this serial,
minimising the cost here.But despite
the slower pace, this isn’t a bad serial at all.Indeed, it’s an interesting premise handled
admirably.

Episode 1 opens with the stunning and iconic scene with yon
“flying beastie!” looming up over our intrepid travellers, as Hines’ Jamie
McCrimmon, out of his own time, is faced by the magic of the aircraft.The use of genuine footage, as opposed to
stock footage, is wonderful, although the cross editing does leave a little to
be desired – there is evidently no threat to the TARDIS, and whilst Jamie’s
terror is understandable, the fear in the rest of the crew is less clear.The excellence of Jamie’s character, though,
lies in these little moments which refer back to his history.The Doctor has never had a companion from
Earth’s history before, with the exception of Katarina, who joined the crew in
the last five minutes of The Myth Makers and
proceeded to wander around aimlessly as though she were tripping on acid,
before dying during the very next serial.As such, what Jamie allows is for the audience to understand the events
through the eyes of the companion.Unlike with contemporary companions, for whom the audience previously
was able to see the events and understand them, Jamie allows the show to return
somewhat to its educational remit; his lack of understanding of even the most
basic things allows us to appreciate the wonder behind them.

Within moments, however, not only have the crew scattered
away from the airplane looming over them, they come face-to-face with some of
London’s finest, and upon the orders of the Doctor, they swiftly
“scatter!”Ben, for some unknown reason,
runs directly at the police officer,
whilst the other three run in approximately the same direction away from him.Cutting away to the Commandant, we are given
the chance to fully appreciate the superb scale allowed by filming at Gatwick
airport; everything seems so vast, and cutting between our heroes and their
pursuers, to these enormous offices and overbearing hangars creates a grand
scale rarely seen before in the show.Colin
Gordon is wonderful as the Commandant, and from the very first appearance we
can see the potential allowed by such a part – a fastidious and slightly
doddery official, the type of character Troughton’s Doctor has been
intentionally mocking since his first serial as the Second Doctor.Whilst Hartnell’s Doctor was stubborn and had
a tendency to mock official people, Troughton is intentionally
anti-establishment, and as such a run-in is inevitable.

Before that, though, we follow the fates of the disparate
group of time travellers.With Ben
hiding out in a hangar and Troughton and Jamie hiding behind two massive plane
wheels, we cut to Polly, who instigates the entire story by hiding in Chameleon
Tours’ hangar, witnessing the execution of a man.When she returns to the Doctor, finding him
and Jamie still beneath the wheels, it is a strong moment of foreshadowing when
she questions “But where’s... what about Ben...?”And this brings me to my biggest issue with The Faceless Ones.

Ultimately, The
Faceless Ones is a companion-led story.Rather than leading the story, though, it is a functional story for us
to bid farewell to Polly and Ben.Whilst
they have not been around too long, they are memorable as companions for the
simple fact that they were there during
the first ever regeneration.This
momentous occasion was witnessed by these two hip and cool kids from London in
the swinging sixties.As such, they
helped the audience to bridge the gap between Hartnell and Troughton,
facilitating the change and allowing us to better understand what
happened.With the arrival of Jamie in The Highlanders, though, these two lost
all purpose.They are no longer our eyes
and ears.Instead, they are simply
cluttering up the TARDIS.When they
arrived, they were evidently realised as replacements for Ian and Barbara –
like anyone could replace Ian and Barbara! – and so were written asaccidental travellers, desperate to get
home.Here, then, they get to return
home, and whilst their farewell story is nowhere near as ignominious as Dodo’s,
which also served as Ben and Polly’s introduction, let’s not forget, it still
does not do credit to these faithful wanderers through time and space.In fact, it is even more telling of their
unimportance as characters that they are even returned to Earth on the very day
that they left – as far as the world is concerned, these two have never been
anywhere or done anything of any significance.

The villains of the piece, the Faceless Ones of the title, are not seen until the cliffhanger of
this first part.Instead, we are treated
to the crisply-spoken menace of Blade and Spencer, played with smashing menace
by Donald Pickering and Victor Winding.After executing the Detective Inspector, Winding’s Spencer calls up Pickering’s
Captain Blade to report the situation, telling him that the man discovered “the
postcards”, which, at this stage in the serial, seems like the most incongruous
and ridiculous sentence imaginable.Of
course, via their superb CCTV system, the pair then witness the Doctor, Jamie
and Polly searching the body, where we are informed that the weapon used to
kill him was a ray gun capable of electrocuting, rather than a standard
gun.The fact that Troughton refers to
the singed clothing hints at something horrific which we don’t get to see – and
also foreshadows the appearance of the eponymous Faceless Ones, as we can imagine the singed flesh of DI
Gascoigne.

After this comes one of the most telling scenes in the
entire serial, and one which reinforces my point about the unfair treatment of
Polly and Ben – Ben has not been seen since the beginning of the story, and
here we have the Doctor and Jamie, walking side-by-side, chattering away like
best of friends while Polly is picked off from the back of the group, without
the other two even noticing.After three
serials in which Jamie has done nothing but
protect Polly, it is almost as though Hines has realised that without them
gone he gets given far more to do, and so turns a blind eye as Spencer picks
her up and takes her away.When they
discuss Polly’s fate, however, an interesting line comes – “We’ll gain nothing
by questioning her”.It is as though the
cast and crew themselves realise that she is now an irrelevance, and whilst the
Doctor and Jamie do return to search for her, they very promptly give up and
leave to speak to the authorities, without so much as opening a packing crate
or looking behind some boxes.

The scenes in the airport proper are magnificent, as the
Doctor and Jamie wander the corridors of the arrivals lounge.Hines’ open-mouthed wonder is perfectly
delivered as he paces back and forth, agog.To see the Doctor – Troughton’s Doctor, no less – being wrapped up the
mundane nonsense of bureaucracy is fantastic, as is Jamie’s failure to understand
the social norms of the time. Similarly,
during the report to the Commandant, Jamie spills the truth – “he was
electrocuted.With a ray gun!” – in such
a smug and self-assured way that we cannot help but admire his enthusiasm.Of course, he is undermining the realism of
the story; in a show like Doctor Who,
we can take the story with a pinch of salt, as we have followed the adventurers
through time and space – a well-spoken man with a ray gun is nothing to
us.For the Commandant, though, it is
all too preposterous, and yet Jamie, who takes all of this in his stride,
doesn’t seem to get that; he has seen flying metal birds with people in them
today, so that’s nothing.Here, Hulke
and Ellis, the writers, achieve a wonderful balance, between what we take for
granted, the modern miracles, and those fantastic elements of futurism.

The first appearance of the arm of one of the Faceless Ones
shows some magnificent makeup, which is exceptionally effective, and the
interruption from the Doctor, Jamie and the Commandant again allows some levity
– seeing Troughton crawling about on hands and knees with a magnifying glass
under the feet of the officials is fantastic.Seeing Blade and Spencer escorting one of the Chameleons up an escalator
is again horrific, as we have the juxtaposition of the normal and the
monstrous, and those final moments consolidate that fear – the crispy,
featureless face, bobbing frantically on slumped shoulders as though struggling
to breathe, is one of the most horrific images in the series up to this point.

The brief moment in episode 1 where the Doctor and Jamie
meet Polly again brings me to my second issue with this serial, and this one is
harder to ignore.The entire premise of
the Chameleons’ scheme is utterly ridiculous, for two reasons.Likewise, Blade and Spencer, whilst they are
chilling and dastardly, are two of the most incompetent bad guys ever.The postcard scam makes no sense.The idea that they are kidnapping entire
air-craft filled with passengers makes no sense.And the stupidest thing of all is that not
only do they not kill the Doctor when they have the chance, they instead kidnap
one of his companions, seemingly brainwash her (poor Polly, second serial in a
row!) and then return her to the airport, in her original clothes, to work on
the front desk of Chameleon Tours, no less, with a foreign name.So when the Doctor and Jamie inevitably turn
up – they are investigating the company, lest we forget – they are confronted
by someone who not only looks exactly like Polly, is dressed exactly like Polly
was before she disappeared and, to make matters worse, sounds exactly like
Polly despite allegedly being Swiss and called Michelle!

Of course, it isn’t really her.Instead, it’s a Chameleon who has assimilated
her appearance, and the scene later in episode 2 where Ben finds her lying,
motionless, in a box, is fairly horrible.But the trouble is that we have another episode in the airport, of the
group running around, with not much happening in the meantime.Episode two is almost entirely filler – we
see Meadows’ transference and the Chameleon replacement going out to work in
his stead – and a rather enjoyable moment where his vocal chords are fine-tuned.There’s the fantastic moment where Ben, Jamie
and the Doctor are reunited in a photo booth and they have to fake a cheesy
smile.But the escape from the police
and security group at the airport is all a little camp and silly for me –
Hines’ narration on the audio reports that, at one point, they are hiding
behind newspapers which are not only “foreign – it is also upside down”.This may have been a great visual gag.Sadly, with only the soundtrack to base it
upon, the action falls a little flat.

What the soundtrack does allow, however, is for the
incidental music to come to the fore, and the stock music used here is superb,
really setting the mood.From what we can see, in episodes 1 and 3, the
direction is clever and fast-paced, with Gerry Mill electing to use varied
angles and a touch of deep-focus photography to make the story move along at an
interesting, if slightly slow, pace.And
the performances are consistently good, with one possible exception – Pauline
Collins, whose appearance as Samantha Briggs allegedly led to the production
team offering her a role as a companion full-time.Her accent alone would make this unthinkable
– let us not forget poor Dodo Chaplet, who lost her accent within moments of
being in the TARDIS – but more on her as we look at episode 3.

Once the Doctor and Jamie are caught again, though, we have
the frankly disturbing moment where the Doctor pretends that a rubber ball in
his pocket is a bomb.Now, this speaks
volumes of the world in which we live nowadays that no one – literally no one –
can make this type of joke.People are
arrested for even the slightest suggestion of such an action.In the meantime, this is the last we see of
Ben and Polly – although they have a seen in episode 6 wherein they wave
farewell to the Doctor and Jamie which was pre-recorded.This then is their final day working for Doctor Who.What makes this all the more tragic though is
that it is actually a very strong episode for Michael Craze.He looks like he’s about to save the day,
stumbling upon the plot accidentally as he hides within the Chameleon Tours
hangar – they really should lock that door, shouldn’t they?! – and returns
later, discovering Polly asleep in a crate.Sadly, though, he is instantly shot with a stun gun, and the same fate
awaits him; he is written out with not a bang, but a whimper.

Oh, and episode 2 features the new theme tune...!So... yeah...

Episode 3 moves – yay! – so we at least have the benefit of
judging this one based on action, rather than simply by telesnaps and audio
tracks.The episode opens where the last
left, with Troughton becoming overcome by fumes after getting trapped within
the hangar, but his escape is rather ingenious, feigning unconsciousness before
turning the ray gun on his attacker.The
scene in which Spenser is staring, vacantly, into the camera before regaining
his senses is wonderfully chilling.

These scenes are intercut with Crossland – played with
wonderful ‘boys’ own’ charm by Bernard Kay – dealing with Jamie and
Samantha.Pauline Collins’ character is
something of an oddity though – she is evidently designed by the writers to be
a replacement companion, and her banter with Jamie is excellent, as she coaxes
him into keeping her company on her separate investigation.Her investigative skills are the way in which
the group manages to unravel the secret of the postcard scam, and her shrugging
away of Jamie’s arm when he attempts to console her shows a depth to her which
many female characters in Doctor Who are
usually lacking.

What The Faceless Ones
does marvellously is cement the plot devices which become synonymous with
Pertwee’s era of Doctor Who.Whilst Hulke will later write for the show
alone – and his serials also feature themes which this puts out the groundwork
for, which we’ll discuss nearer the end of this blog – here he introduces the
Doctor fighting endless pen-pushing and bureaucracy.Even when the Commandant finally accepts
certain truths within the Doctor’s story, he still pushes the subject of the
Doctor’s immigrant status and lack of passport.

As Blade, Donald Pickering’s delivery is smashing, and the
crisp and calm delivery of two of his best lines come in this episode; “You
Earthmen are more use to us alive” and then my personal favourite, in response
to Crossland’s mention of the long arm of the law – “I don’t think it will
reach where you’re going” – are cracking.There is a disturbing undertone to this serial, and one which has rarely
been exploited by the show in all of its time; the concept of CCTV is one which
provides a chilling criticism of modern society in general, and here in episode
3 it is particularly pertinent.In
episode 2, we watched Troughton watching Ben on CCTV as he was attacked, and
the Doctor couldn’t help.

Here, though, we watch Spenser as he watches the Doctor
collapse in the hangar.There is a
bizarre sense of impotence and voyeurism throughout, as we watch people
watching others.The panning camera
through the cabin of the aircraft is handled wonderfully by Gerry Mill,
although it is ridiculous, of course.Who exactly is manipulating the camera in the cabin, particularly as it
is a diegetic image within the plot framework as we watch Crossland watching
the footage.

Episode 4 is once again missing and we are back to audio
files and telesnaps.This is something
of a shame, particularly in the case of the cliffhanger here, which frankly
sounds incredible, as the ship suddenly converts itself into a space rocket
before bursting upwards into outer space.What we cannot see, and therefore are left to wonder at, is the balking
stupidity of Spenser.After his
ridiculous comments about interviews and his inability to kill anyone in the
last few weeks, here Hulke and Ellis take it up a notch by having him commit a
James Bond-esque murder, with a laser gun slowly moving towards him.And then he doesn’t even hang around to
watch!It’s ridiculous, and frustrating,
but we can only imagine how silly it looked.And they get saved by Samantha, too!Go, girl! Of course, it’s playing on the arch stereotype that all women
are vain and carry mirrors around, but even so, it saves their lives,
deflecting the laser beam away.

Very little else really happens in episode 4 – there’s an
action sequence involving an RAF fighter jet which sounds exciting, but we
can’t see.There’s Jamie kissing
Samantha to distract her while he steals her ticket.In fact, probably the highlight of this
episode – besides the plane turning into a rocket – is probably the fact that
Jamie’s courage knows no bounds.He is
even willing to go in one of the things which, three episodes earlier, terrified
him.

Everything finally seems to come to some form of resolution
in episode 5, though, and the plot begins to ratchet up to speed.Via some fascinating exposition, we learn a
great deal about the alien invaders.Indeed, we learn that this slow invasion of theirs – which requires
50,000 bodies! – is the result of horrific mutilations and we end up feeling
sympathy for The Faceless Ones.Whilst they may have murdered a few
people, including DI Gascoigne, and kidnapped thousands of others, including
Brian Briggs, they are ultimately rather pathetic and desperate.And this is the Hulke formula, one which he
will perfect whilst writing for Pertwee; as we see in his later serials Doctor Who and the Silurians, The
Ambassadors of Death and The Sea
Devils, the concept of misunderstood alien species needing human assistance
is further developed.Here, though, we
can tell that Hulke is in the early stages of his career writing for Doctor Who, though.Typically, Hulke does long stories well – he
co-wrote The War Games! – and also
does the slow-burn of stories effectively.Here, though, it just seems a little ropier than in his later scripts,
far less honed.This is proto-Hulke, rather
than Hulke at his finest, but he’s still using those ideals he would assimilate
into his finest scripts.

Episode 5 also has the horrific image of the drawers filled
with dolls, each representing one of the missing people.As the story continues at this increased
pace, we discover the true reason for the aliens’ disfigured appearances, as
well as the appearance of DI Crossland, in fact the Director of the
Chameleons.The scenes between the
Doctor and Nurse Pinto have been fantastic across the last two episodes, and
now they have managed to infiltrate the space station, pretending to be
Chameleons. After four episodes to-ing
and fro-ing back and forth in Gatwick, it’s nice that we’re finally treated to
a change in scenery with the space station, which sounds fantastic through the
use of stock music, tinkling and twinkling away eerily as the Doctor wanders
the corridors.

One niggling thing which confuses me somewhat about episode
5 is the way in which the replicas retain all their memories, and yet lose
their accent.Now, it is chilling,
seeing Kay return to his traditional received pronunciation.Even more unnerving is seeing Hines, whose
natural Scottish brogue we have become readily accustomed to over the past few
weeks, suddenly speaking in a Standard English accent.But it once again undermines the entire plot;
there’s a lovely touch where the Chameleon replacement knows more about the man’s
life than his record shows.Despite
this, they do not assimilate the accent of their victims, undermining any
potential infiltration of their real lives.

The cliffhanger at the end of episode 5 sounds utterly
horrifying, particularly through the description of the oncoming creatures as
being in their “raw state” as they surround Nurse Pinto and the Doctor.Episode 6, meanwhile, finally sees the story
reach its conclusion.With Crossland
actually the Director of the Chameleons, and the Doctor now trapped with them
on the space station, there suddenly seems to be a sense of urgency, one which
has sadly been lacking in the last two episodes.As the Doctor holds the threat of death over
them – with the doubles discovered in the back of cars, randomly dotted around,
by every member of staff from the airport – the Doctor is now able to endanger
their lives, and so instead the Chameleons step back and scuttle away, their
tails between their legs.Of course, the
idea of debate, rather than all-out war, is very Malcolm Hulke.Indeed, this is proto-Pertwee at its finest,
with the Doctor desperate to embark upon negotiations rather than actually harm
anyone.

But that’s the problem.It’s not really a pay-off like we’d expect; there is no big bang, no
ethical dilemma forcing the Doctor to choose.Instead, for one time only, we get negotiations... and they stick to
them.The Doctor and the humans and the
aliens all make an agreement, and stick to it.It all seems rather anticlimactic, somehow.We’ve come to expect certain things of the
show, but what is telling is that still, even now, the show is forcing us to
question where it is headed.Even now,
nearly at the end of the fourth season, we don’t know exactly what is
happening, and where we are going.Troughton is still making his mark on the show, shaking off the last
vestiges of Hartnell’s tenure.

Speaking of shaking off the last of Hartnell’s tenure,
though, we come to the last ten minutes.And here we are reunited with Ben and Polly, just in time for the end of
the story.We leave the Commandant and
the real Crossland together to “tidy up”, and the Doctor and his companions
return to the airport to collect the TARDIS before a convoluted farewell is
uttered to Ben and Polly, after a touching goodbye to Samantha, the Companion
who never was.As I said earlier, the
scene is better than we were given with Dodo, but even so it seems rushed and
unfair given all that these two have been through with the Doctor.The realisation of the date – “July the 20th
1966, to be precise” – smacks of lazy writing, but what is terrific is that
this swiftly becomes the busiest day in Doctor
Who history.Not only is July 20th
1966 the day when Britain is attacked by The
War Machines and The Faceless Ones,
but also the first stop in a new adventure with the Daleks.

And so, Ben leaves to become and Admiral.Polly leaves to cook him dinner and have
babies and other girly things. And Jamie and the Doctor are off on a new
adventure, off to find the TARDIS, wherever it may be.

About Me

Scott Edwards is a teacher of English and Theatre Studies, with a BAHons in English Literature and Film Studies.He is also a self-professed ‘ming-mong’, and is now going to return to some Classic Doctor Who.